Here's a comment on the bill from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Here's a copy of our joint release. The bill will need a lot of support to pass, because the banks have already started their counter-campaign. They'll be calling it "price-fixing" and worse. They'll be reminding Congress that (primarily through their own mistakes and missteps), they've just lost a lot of money in the mortgage meltdown. Yet, according to the Federal Reserve, credit cards are consistently the most profitable line of business for banks (the 2007 report; older reports are here (scroll down) on this hidden internal Fed page. Don't even think about expecting a press release when it comes out-- the Fed hates that Congress even requires it to conduct this study.

The simple fact of the matter is this: Owning a credit card company is a license to steal. You can change the rules at any time for any reason, including no reason. You can change the price of products that consumer already bought-- with retroactive interest rate hikes applied to previous balances. You can raise rates of customers who've never broken your rules-- to north of 36% APR or more. A consumer cannot take you to court if your practices are unfair-- his or her only recourse is the corporate-controlled private court system known as binding mandatory arbitration. Here are more credit card ripoffs from our PIRG Truthaboutcredit.org campaign. A highlight of the campaign is our FEESA counter-marketing campaign on college campuses.